Pakistan Reports Killing of 29 Fighters in Clashes Near Afghan Border

Updated by Faith Barbara N Ruhinda at 1246 EAT on Monday 29 June 2025

Pakistan’s security forces have carried out ground operations and air strikes along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in response to a series of deadly attacks, killing 29 fighters, according to officials.

In a post on social media, Pakistani Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said the operations were launched following multiple attacks by armed groups across the country.

“Three targets in Paktia, Paktika and Kunar were destroyed during precision strikes,” Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said on X, referring to three eastern Afghan provinces.

The Afghan Taliban government’s deputy spokesman, Hamdullah Fitrat, said the Pakistani strikes killed at least 36 civilians and wounded 163 others.

Pakistan has experienced a surge in attacks targeting police and security forces in recent years. Authorities have blamed the Pakistan Taliban, known as Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), and allied armed groups for much of the violence.

The strikes came a day after gunmen and attackers using explosives targeted the regional headquarters of the paramilitary Rangers in Karachi, killing three soldiers. Security forces later killed three attackers and arrested another, whom the military identified as a wounded Afghan national.

The Pakistan-based militant group Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the TTP, claimed responsibility for the Karachi assault in a statement on Saturday night.
Tarar said Pakistan’s latest cross-border operation targeted hideouts and safe havens used by the TTP.

The TTP is a separate armed group from the Afghan Taliban, though the two remain allied.

The latest operations are likely to further strain already tense relations between Islamabad and Kabul.

Sunday’s cross-border strikes and ground operation came less than three weeks after Pakistan’s military carried out air strikes on what it described as militant hideouts inside Afghanistan. The latest escalation ended about a month of relative calm following what Islamabad had previously described as an “open war” between the neighbours, despite international efforts to broker a lasting peace.

The flare-up is part of months of tit-for-tat military actions between the two countries. Hundreds of people have been killed in cross-border violence since February, when Afghanistan launched retaliatory strikes after Pakistan conducted air raids inside Afghan territory.

Multiple rounds of internationally mediated peace talks have so far failed to secure a lasting ceasefire.

China hosted both sides in April, after which Beijing said Pakistan and Afghanistan had agreed not to escalate tensions and to work towards a negotiated settlement.

Since last year, Pakistan has carried out several strikes along the border and inside Afghanistan, targeting alleged hideouts of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and other armed groups.

Pakistan accuses Afghanistan’s Taliban government of harbouring militants responsible for deadly attacks inside its territory, particularly those carried out by the TTP.

-Aljzeera

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